People and events:

• PERSONALS INVOLVE IN ARTS RECEIVE RUSSIAN NATIONAL OLYMPUS PRIZE
• SPIRITUAL TRADITIONS AND MODERN THEATRE (Results of the first international festival of Golden Knight)
• MOTLEY MOSCOW AUTUMN (At the 25th international modern music festival)
• DEDICATION TO OLEG KAGAN
• YOUNG WRITERS CONFERENCE
• ALEXEI BATALOV'S FATE AND PROFESSION

PERSONS INVOLVE IN ARTS RECEIVE THE RUSSIAN NATIONAL OLYMPUS PRIZE

This year's Russian National Olympus prize awarding ceremony was held in the Russian President's official hall of receptions in the Kremlin on the 18th of November. This is a prestigious public award that symbolizes unity of the power and society and history and present day. The prize marks the producers of both material and spiritual values and is awarded to groups, enterprises and individuals, the prominent Russian citizens, for their significant contribution to the development of Russian society. Among this year's laureates are composer Tikhon Khrennikov and painter and sculptor Zurab Tsereteli.
The president of the Academy of Arts 70-yers-old Zurab Tsereteli was awarded the prize under the nomination of "Super-Star" and is very famous in the country as the creator of flickering decorative mosaic panels, light emitting colorful stained-glass windows and grand compositions from molded and enchased metal. Zurab Tsereteli's more than 40-year career has been successful and marked with the expansion of his creative areas. The painter feels excellently the city atmosphere and this is the reason why his monuments have appeared in Moscow, St. Petersburg, London, Tokyo, New York, Brasilia, Paris and Seville. His works have the expression of global nature but at the same time he has always been faithful to his Georgian roots and Russian classical arts, which he studied.
The feeling of pleasure and the affirmation of life as a gift are penetrated into Zurab Tsereteli's creative work. Obsessed by desire to make the life beautiful the painter is always in a mobilized state. He has endless ideas, which appear one after another. In fact, he always realizes these ideas.
Zurab Tsereteli was the First Russian citizen to put forward the initiative to immortalize the victims of the terrorist attacks in the United States on the 11th of September 2001. He believes that grief and victory must be shown in the monument. Zurab Tsereteli says: "I have already started work on the sculpture "Tears". I can remember the question asked by Americans: How this idea came to you? I explained them that when I came to the street after the tragedy in the United States I saw tears in the eyes of Muscovites. They were the tears of grief. But they will be the tears of pleasure when the terrorism is defeated throughout the world."
Composer Tikhon Khrennikov who marked his 90th birthday this year was awarded the Russian National Olympus prize and the title of "the Order of Civil Honour". He is a master of extraordinary talent in composing. Each his work wins the hearts first and foremost by its sincerity and warm-heartedness.
Tikhon Khrennikov has been actively continuing his creative career over 70 years. He is also successfully engaged in public work and teaching. He headed the Union of Composers of the USSR for 43 years. He was awarded the highest state prizes and titles and many international prizes. Earlier this year UNESCO, the United Nations cultural, scientific and education organization, awarded him Mozart medal. Tikhon Khrennikov considers Mozart's life and creative work as his guiding star.
Works by Khrennikov have always been in full view. His operas and ballets have been staged at the Bolshoi and Mariinsky theatres and symphonies have been included in the concert programmes of Leopold Stokovsky and Eugene Ormandi, world famous musicians. He devoted several concerts to remarkable artists such as cellist Mstislav Rostropovich and violinist Leonid Kogan. Meanwhile, the melodies from films are still attracted by music-lovers.
Tikhon Khrennikov's enviable creative long-life is amazing. Tikhon Khrennikov has done so much work in the past ten years a young composer would have been jealous of. Khrennikov says: "I have get used to work all the time and I can't live without work. I write and compose and the rest is a supplement to the basic work. My brain composes music round the clock. Love and melody are the foundation of my creative work."

SPIRITUAL TRADITIONS AND MODERN THEATRE
(Results of the first international festival of Golden Knight)

The first international festival of Golden Knight has ended in Moscow. During the festival theatre groups from six countries staged 28 plays. The organizers of the festival and its president Nikolai Burlyaev, an actor and a director, gathered theatres of different styles of art and wished to present the panorama of artistic achievements fit in well for Orthodox theatre. But life found to be richer than expected.
An actor at the Moscow Art Theatre Nikolai Penkov says: "I feel that it is even dangerous makes the theatre church. Theatre means consistent passions and consistent immediate life. Theatre is consistent struggle rather than graciousness. As Dostoevsky said it is the place where devil fights with the God on the scene. Theatre must indirectly influence the people's spirit unlike the church that acts directly, unless everything will be boring and falsified."
There were no boring plays in the festival. A member of its jury Bulgarian director Margarit Nikolov says: " There were many productions in which creativity was real. This is not a complement but just a detached view. This was a surprise for me because it was serious professional and creative level. Russia has nothing to worry about the spiritual theatre. I say this frankly since I saw unreliable creative revelation of actors and directors in the festival and self-sacrificing, the saving of souls for those who were in the theatre and unbelievable love that hang in the air."
Bulgaria's National Art theatre was awarded the main prize of the festival, Golden Knight for its play "Orisia". It is a ballet and the group of Isikhia tells the events of Bulgarian people's history in dances and music. The choreograph and producer Neshka Robeva has created a splendid and dramatic play by using different compositions and dancing styles of folklore and at the same time combining them with classical ballet.
The lion's share of the plays took part in the festival was written by Russian and other classical authors in the world. Commenting on this fact director of the festival Yuvenalii Kalantarov, a director and historic, says: "Classical dramas mean in the sense prophecy and instructions by genius who created masterpieces and left them for us as a spiritual legacy. These people can be described as prophets. The talent of a director is to interpret the texts of these authors and their values which the author wished covey to people."
Jury noted the complete penetration into the character and artistic thinking when it awarded Silver Knight to Andrei Dennikov, actor and director of the Obratsov puppet theatre in Moscow for the play of "Confession by a Hooligan" based on the works by Russian poet Sergei Esenin and Bronze Knight to Ermolova Drama Theatre in Moscow for its play of "Iron Will" based on a story by the Russian writer of the 19th century, Nikolai Leskov. The Drama Theatre of the Siberian city of Irkutsk won the "Golden Diploma" for play of "the night before the Christmas" by Nikolai Gogol.
The Golden Diploma for direction was awarded to Sergei Artsibashev of the Mayakovsky Theatre in Moscow for the play of "Karmasovs" based on a novel by the Great Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky. A drama-writer Vladimir Malyagin adapted the great novel for stage. Concerning spiritual traditions of contemporary dramatic art he says: "How to find a language in which a faithful can talk to an unbeliever? At present this is the greatest problem before the world of theatre, literature and cinematography. And the problem is awaiting its own Dostoevsky. A writer of lower rate will not be able to handle the issue."

MOTLEY "MOSCOW AUTUMN"
(At the 25th international modern music festival)

The 25th international modern music festival that started on the 31st of October will end on the 30th of November. It has invited people to 47 concerts where music by 200 composers is being played. The majority of the works is being prepared for the first time. This is a tradition of the festival. This is the reason why "Moscow Autumn" is described as the festival of premieres.
In the past years the festival has increased the number of musicians and stages where concerts are performed. This year concerts are being staged in 7 halls in Moscow and are performed by dozens of groups not only from Russia but also from European, American and Asian countries. The scale of the festival strikes even its consistent participants.
Composer Ivar Arseev says; "In my opinion there are few such musical marathons in the world. Usually, festivals end in 5 or 7 days. It is a very difficult job to stage two concerts a day in different halls and continues this over a month. But I think it is successful and very nice. The festival is well organized and musical. The main thing is that it confirms its international status since many guests are invited from other countries and it has much music news."
"Music News" is a topic of the festival programme devoted to composing schools of many countries. This is an important tradition that has been established in the past ten years, and is attracted by audience. This year concerts by composers from Belgium, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Austria have been staged successfully. Premieres have yet to be performed by American and Italian composers, rare guests of the festival. Two programmes are devoted to French music. Perhaps, the reason for this is closer contacts between Moscow composers and their French colleagues. An honorary guest and a participant of the festival were the remarkable French flautist, Professor of the Paris Conservatoire and the organizer of the flute orchestra, Pierre-Ive Arto. He played music by French composers in the over crowded Rakhmaninov Hall of the Moscow Conservatoire. Later he admitted that he sympathizes deeply Russian music and musicians.
Pierre-Ive Arto says: "I have contacts with many Russian composers, especially Sofia Gubaidulina. I have known her works since the sixties and was one of the first persons to perform her music in France. Later I met with Edison Denisov and Alfred Schnitke. When I came to Moscow in 1997 I met with Yuri Kasparov. It is a great pleasure for me to perform music of these composers. I have a strong affection for Russian music, which is undoubtedly a great music composing school. Like all flautists in the world I regret that Pyotr Tschaikovsky left his concert for flute unfinished. I like very much to play Russian music since it is deeply humane and expressive."
The director of the festival Igor Golubev says: "Many people attend the festival and this pleases us. One of the significant concert was that performed many curious, bright and contrasting music, including choral by the Efrem Podgaits chorus on verses by Tyutchev and music by piano and string trio of late Alexander Chugaev. The concert was remarkable because its programme included quite different kinds of music like in the festival as a whole."
The festival has another tradition of introducing unknown works by composers whose music has long been considered classical. The most fine-sounded premieres were the concerts that staged unknown works by the prominent composers such as Alexander Glazunov and Aram Khachaturyan. Among them was concert-ballad for cello with orchestra devoted to the great Spanish cellist of the 20th century Pablo Kazals by Glazunov and music by Khachaturyan to King Lear and Macbeth, the tragedies by William Shakespeare. The Kompositor Publishing House prepared the notes of these works for the concerts. It also showed a pleasant surprise by forming a new symphony orchestra of the same name as the publishing house with the assistance of the union of Moscow composers. The orchestra is conducted by South Korean No Ta Chol, a graduate from the Vienna High School of Music. He was a director of several orchestras that staged concerts in Europe and America. He and the new orchestra presented the first concerts of unknown Russian classical music. In fact, he knows Russian music quite well. Until recently, he was the chief conductor at the Opera and Ballet Theatre in Nizhny Novgorod, a city on the River Volga. No Ta Chol says: "Russian music is deep and philosophic. These are the qualities that make Russian music attractive. Compared to European music, which is beautiful and even tasty, Russian music appears to be somewhat audacious in its expressions and even ungovernable and wild in character. Despite these peculiarities Russian music has always been deeply substantial."
Festival is going on. It includes several other interesting programmes. We plan to inform you about them and other interesting events that amazed audience.

DEDICATION TO OLEG KAGAN

A weeklong music festival dedicated to Oleg Kagan ended on the 23rd of November in Moscow. Its programme included music by Mozart, Beethoven, Schuman, Schubert, Dvorzhek, Smetana and Russian classics Glinka, Rakhmaninov, Stravinsky and works by contemporary authors. The performance by remarkable musicians re-created the atmosphere of sincerity and spirituality, the qualities that were noted in his entire life as a great violinist and in his creative work.
Oleg Kagan was only 43 when he died. He found courage to stage concerts up to the last days despite he was gravely ill. He played as if he was performing the only one and last concert since he was aware that there would be no second chance. He played music by many authors, especially Mozart. According to his colleges, extremely very high spiritual level of his performance coincided Mozart's style. He played his last concert on the 11th of July 1990 in the summer festival organized for him in Kroit, Germany. Since then Kagan memorial music festivals have been held in Kroit and Moscow.
These are international festivals. Among the participants of the 4th Moscow festival were musicians from Russia, Germany, Denmark, Israel, the Netherlands, Poland, France and Estonia. Young musicians also played together with famous masters such as violinist Victor Tretyakov, violist Yuri Bashmet, piano player Elico Virsaladze and directors Andres Mustonen and Voldemar Nelson. Oleg Kagan united people of different creative talents and musicians of different genres. He was a friend and partner of dozens of performers, including the piano player Alexei Lyubimov.
Recalling Oleg Kagan Alexei Lyubimov says: "There are two types of performers in the musical world. The first embraces soloists who consider solo concerts or solo part accompanied by orchestra as the most important. The second type considers performance in a wide angle by peeping into the history of music, studying various genres and coming into contact with orchestra playing music. Oleg Kagan was the brightest representative of the universal orientation. He knew that closer the contacts among the musicians on the scene, stronger the field of musical space. He considered playing music together and contacts on the scene as a form of co-existence and believed that this is richer than solo performance. The festival that ended deepened the position adhered by Oleg Kagan.
The personality of Oleg Kagan has remained very attractive many years after his death. It's no mare chance that his former partners on the scene, friends and other musicians who knew him and who live out side Russia leave their work and gather in Moscow to mark his birthday on the 21st of November by their performance. It is correct when Alexander Rudin, a cellist and director says: "Festival has acquired still more friends and become vast and more famous in the world and gained momentum."

YOUNG WRITERS CONFERENCE

"Without getting drunk in literary, life convince us once again that there is a need to help talented as ungifted fights his way through. "This poetic expression was written in the past century. But the idea that there is a need for supporting talented has always been actual. A survey in Russian history shows that prominent authors started to write under the influence or support of relatives or mentors. Even the world famous Alexander Pushkin was not an exception. His uncle Vasili Pushkin inoculate in him interest for literature, while poet Vasili Zhukovsky, who taught the future classic literature, helped him to develop talent in poetry. In the beginning of the difficult career young poets or writers try to enlist the support of scholars and get reviews for their works or even recommending letters to publishers. A similar path was passed by many prominent writers, including Vladimir Nobokov who was supported by influential critic Georgy Adamovich and the Nobel laureate Ivan Bunin. Under the local tradition rooted deeply, elder writers not only assess the work by the younger authors but also advice them. Unfortunately, this tradition has lately shaken as society re-oriented to commercial values, which have nothing to do with altruism and disinterested comradeship. As a result young writers depend on themselves and clearly experience a lack of contacts with colleagues, including elder authors. This is a reason why three years ago the social, economic and intellectual fund with the active involvement of popular literature journals such as Znamya, Druzhba Narodov, Inostrannaya Literatura and Nash Sovremennik organized the forum of young writers in Russia.
An organizer of the recent 3rd forum Nataliya Serkova says: "The forum was a part of a programme designed to attract budding writers to the literature world. In the first stage the members of editorial boards visit Russian cities and hold seminars with young writers and read their manuscripts. In the second stage most talented are invited to the forum in a resort of Moscow where young writers upgrade their skills with the guidance of prominent authors."
During the recent forum master classes were held under the guidance of famous Russian prose-writers such as Mikhail Roshin, Oleg Pavlov and Yevgeny Ermolin. Young writers also had discussions with contemporary classical writers such as Fazil Iskanderov, Grigory Baklanov and Vladimir Makanin.
The forums in the past three years have given an opportunity to young writers to start their work successfully. Several participants of the forums won the prestigious literature prizes, including the "Debut" competition and national theatre and literature prizes. Famous writers have recommended to publish works by 50 young participants and many have been published in literature journals. Several authors have been admitted to the Writers Union of Russia and some others were invited to take part in seminars abroad. Forums have led to the creation of the journal of "Prolog" on the Internet for budding writers.

THE FATE AND PROFESSION OF ALEXEI BATALOV

One of the most famous Russian film actors, Alexei Batalov marked his 75th birthday on the 20th of November. His fate as an actor was determined already in his childhood. He was born in a family, which had close links with theatres. His parents and an uncle served the theatre devotedly as they were actors of Moscow Art Theatre. Remarkable artists - the cream of Russian intellectuals, often visited Batalovs. Among these were writer Mikhail Bulgakov, poets Anna Akhmatova and Boris Paternak and composer Dmitri Shostakovic. Alexei Batalov's contacts with them helped him to form his personality, his philosophy and moral views.
It was natural for Alexei Batalov, who considered Moscow Art Theatre his house, to enter its actors' training school and consequently join its group. When he played the role in the film "Big Family" directed by Iosif Kheifits in 1954 he linked his life with cinematography. His role in the film was very important to the local cinematography at the time. A new type of a hero, an intelligent worker who had clear understanding about love, self-respect and self-affirmation, appeared on the screen.
Alexei Batalov played in another four films by the renowned director, Iosif Kheifits. Among them was "The Lady With a Lapdog" based on the short story of the same name by Anton Chekhov. The film revealed new areas of his talent. Alexei Batalov created the character of a Russian nobleman, a person with strong moral principles but had no courage to change the routine life. Love unexpectedly inspired, awakens him after a mental dream. The film was awarded several international prizes, including the prize for high humanism and excellent artistic performance at the Cannes film festival.
After the film "Cranes Are Flying" produced by Mikhail Kalatozov Alexei Batalov became world famous. At the Cannes film festival in 1958 the film won Palm d'Or. In this case Alexei Batalov made a great contribution. He played the role of a young soldier of the Second World War who voluntarily went to the front but not returned. The role of this young, handsome and talented person who had bright prospects and aims for the future was a symbol of cruelty and senseless of the war and became a poetic generalization of the fates of an entire generation of Soviet youth who were killed in the Second World War.
"Moscow does not believe in tears", a contemporary melodrama is another film honoured internationally in which Alexei Batalov plays a role. It was awarded American Oscar. The director of the film Vladimir Menshov had to persuade Alexei Batalov more than once to play the role. The film-lovers and the actor himself have already got used to screen's image as an intellectual. Batalov played the role of a worker who falls in love with heroine of the story. And he played the role so excellently and fascinatingly that he became women's idol at the age of 50 and they embodied in him their aspirations and hopes. Vladimir Menshov explains the success of Alexei Batalov: "He could correlate his humane nature and charm with the role in an extra-ordinary manner. The combination of the actor's gentleness and the firmness in actions and expressions of the character created an unforgettable image, which found to be an idle man for millions of women. Alexei Batalov's nobility is his great dignity. The actor can correlate this quality to his images. This creates an indissoluble link between personality and images. Only great actors can do so."
Alexei Batalov directed films too. He produced three films: "Greatcoat" by Nikolai Gogol, "Three Fat men" by Yuri Olesha and "Gambler" by Fyodor Dostoevsky. All three are first and foremost examples of preserved attitude toward the primary sources of literature. In fact, Alexei Batalov played a role of circus acrobat in the film Three Fat Men in which he walks on a rope in a dizzy height saving from chase. He did this with out a safety back up.
Alexei Batalov teaches in the institute of cinematography. He writes books too. Among these are "The fate and Profession" about theatre and "The Legendary Ordynka" about Russian artistic intellectuals. For several generations Alexei Batalov has been the symbol of spirituality of a Russian. Russian cinematography awarded Alexei Batalov the prize of "For Honour ad Dignity" this year. This reflects that he enjoys great respect and honour in the country.
 11/27/2003